London Riot (How Could This Happen in a 'More Civilized' Society?)

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This is IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English.
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This week, Britain faced its worst riots since the nineteen eighties. The unrest began in London and spread to other cities, including Manchester, Birmingham and Liverpool.
Police have been launching raids, making arrests and studying images from security cameras. Officials charged hundreds of people with disorder, violence and stealing from looted stores.
Police said a sixty-eight-year-old man became the fifth person to die as a result of the violence. He was attacked during the riots.
The rioting began last Saturday after a peaceful demonstration over the deadly police shooting of a twenty-nine-year-old man. The shooting happened last week in a poor neighborhood in north London.
Rioters burned buildings and cars, broke into hundreds of stores and fought with police.
Britain had its first calm night on Wednesday. Sixteen thousand police officers will remain on duty in London through the coming days. This is the most ever during peacetime.
Prime Minister David Cameron says he will seek advice from American cities that have fought gang violence. These include Boston, Los Angeles and New York.
Mr. Cameron returned early from a vacation to deal with the unrest. He said he was considering interfering with electronic devices and websites that rioters have used to organize their activities.
DAVID CAMERON: "Free flow of information can be used for good but it can also be used for ill. So we are working with the police, the intelligence services and industry to look at whether it would be right to stop people from communicating via these websites and services when we know they are plotting violence, disorder and criminality."
Mr. Cameron spoke Thursday at an emergency meeting of parliament. He said the violence was not political but criminal.
DAVID CAMERON: "Mr. Speaker, we will not put up with this in our country. We will not allow a culture of fear to exist on our streets, and we will do whatever it takes to restore law and order and to rebuild our communities."
In Birmingham, three Pakistani men were killed Wednesday when a car struck them as they tried to protect businesses in their community. Hours later, Tariq Jahan, the father of twenty-one-year-old victim Haroon Jahan, appealed for calm.
TARIQ JAHAN: "Basically, I lost my son. Blacks, Asians, whites -- we all live in the same community. Why do we have to kill one another? What started these riots, and what’s escalated? Why are we doing this?"
Many people blamed the unrest on high unemployment, slow economic recovery and cuts to public services by the new British government. Mr. Cameron blamed it on selfishness, lack of responsibility, poor discipline in schools and bad parenting.
Chris Hamnett lives in north London, not far from some of the worst rioting.
CHRIS HAMNETT: "Essentially, what we've seen is rioting for fun and profit. This is not people expressing their anger against an oppressive state. This is people thinking it would be nice to get a slice of the action.”
The riots were centered in neighborhoods with large African and Caribbean populations. Both groups have a history of tensions with the police. Basani Mabyalane lives in the area.
BASANI MABYALANE: "I feel there is maybe more that could be done to empower the young people because, from what I saw yesterday, to me it looked like they don’t have much to do. They have got the time. They have got the energy. But they are using that energy on negative things.”
In the north London neighborhood of Haringey, some young people are using their energy to do positive things. They have formed a group called HYPE: Haringey’s Young People Empowered.
One of those young people is Erica Lopez. She thinks a majority of the rioters simply wanted to loot. But she says she understands and shares the anger of many of her young neighbors over a lack of jobs and cuts in youth services.
ERICA LOPEZ: “The government really needs to actually take time and listen to these young people because for a long time they have been crying in silence saying, 'This is what matters to me.' They have really been crying for a long time.”
And that's IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English. I'm Steve Ember.

America, is this your Democracy you are campaigning all over the world?

Watch New Police Spray Wall Street Female Protesters with pepper.

Occupy Wall Street Movement

Here is, formally and finally, what Occupy Wall Street says, and wants. It is, in essence, their Special Comment. As we gather together in solidarity to express a feeling of mass injustice, we must not lose sight of what brought us together. We write so that all people who feel wronged by the corporate forces of the world can know that we are your allies. As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. We come to you at a time when corporations, which place profit over people, self-interest over justice, and oppression over equality, run our governments. We have peaceably assembled here, as is our right, to let these facts be known. They have taken our houses through an illegal foreclosure process, despite not having the original mortgage. They have taken bailouts from taxpayers with impunity, and continue to give Executives exorbitant bonuses. They have perpetuated inequality and discrimination in the workplace based on age, the color of one's skin, sex, gender identity and sexual orientation. They have poisoned the food supply through negligence, and undermined the farming system through monopolization. They have profited off of the torture, confinement, and cruel treatment of countless animals, and actively hide these practices. They have continuously sought to strip employees of the right to negotiate for better pay and safer working conditions. They have held students hostage with tens of thousands of dollars of debt on education, which is itself a human right. They have consistently outsourced labor and used that outsourcing as leverage to cut workers’ healthcare and pay. They have influenced the courts to achieve the same rights as people, with none of the culpability or responsibility. They have spent millions of dollars on legal teams that look for ways to get them out of contracts in regards to health insurance. They have sold our privacy as a commodity. They have used the military and police force to prevent freedom of the press. They have deliberately declined to recall faulty products endangering lives in pursuit of profit. They determine economic policy, despite the catastrophic failures their policies have produced and continue to produce. They have donated large sums of money to politicians, who are responsible for regulating them. They continue to block alternate forms of energy to keep us dependent on oil. They continue to block generic forms of medicine that could save people’s lives or provide relief in order to protect investments that have already turned a substantial profit. They have purposely covered up oil spills, accidents, faulty bookkeeping, and inactive ingredients in pursuit of profit. They purposefully keep people misinformed and fearful through their control of the media. They have accepted private contracts to murder prisoners even when presented with serious doubts about their guilt. They have perpetuated colonialism at home and abroad. They have participated in the torture and murder of innocent civilians overseas. They continue to create weapons of mass destruction in order to receive government contracts. To the people of the world, we, the New York City General Assembly occupying Wall Street in Liberty Square, urge you to assert your power. Exercise your right to peaceably assemble; occupy public space; create a process to address the problems we face, and generate solutions accessible to everyone. To all communities that take action and form groups in the spirit of direct democracy, we offer support, documentation, and all of the resources at our disposal. Join us and make your voices heard! The statement issued from Zuccotti Park, by the general assembly, at Occupy Wall Street. We'll continue to update you on the events and violence that ensued this evening.

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